good thoughts on aggy Fran

[injuredinmelee]

from hornfans.com the first post makes alot fo sense. I didnt read them all and I apologize if they start bashing unnecessarily.
Fran the aggy version of Mackovic? (http://forums.hornfans.com/php/wwwthreads/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=football&Number=4421069&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=0&fpart=)

[AggieJohn]

ive heard this argument before and probably have to agree with him...........it's a high power coach, in a high power job, with no high power wins

[KTJ]

I thought the other thread was better.

The one posted by Mitch Cumsteen.

:D

[Macarthur]

I've been a big Fran Fan for some time due to a family member being a TCU grad.

I think he's a great coach. He certainly hasn't lived up to expectations, but I think the rebuilding at A&M was much more involved than anyone ever thought it would be. He came into a very unstructured program. He is the complete opposite of unstructured. Therefore, he almost had to turn over the complete roster. I don't care how good a coach you are, that is a steep task. Some may have heard this story, but when Fran arrived at A&M, they had one or two players in the entire program that benched 400lbs. They now have something like 40.

This year he has his players and his QB leading the team. He must have a big year because the excuses I used before don't apply any more.

For the record, I think they will have a big year. I think they have been a sleeping giant for some time.

[raider red 2000]

Originally posted by Macarthur
I've been a big Fran Fan for some time due to a family member being a TCU grad.

I think he's a great coach. He certainly hasn't lived up to expectations, but I think the rebuilding at A&M was much more involved than anyone ever thought it would be. He came into a very unstructured program. He is the complete opposite of unstructured. Therefore, he almost had to turn over the complete roster. I don't care how good a coach you are, that is a steep task. Some may have heard this story, but when Fran arrived at A&M, they had one or two players in the entire program that benched 400lbs. They now have something like 40.

This year he has his players and his QB leading the team. He must have a big year because the excuses I used before don't apply any more.

For the record, I think they will have a big year. I think they have been a sleeping giant for some time.


i am undecided on FRAN- why i dont like him....i have heard that he cusses out assistants in front of the players.

why i do like him- he sucks and TECH will keep beating the AGS the longer he stays :)


BTW- it is football not a bench press contest :)

[Macarthur]

Originally posted by raider red 2000
i am undecided on FRAN- why i dont like him....i have heard that he cusses out assistants in front of the players.

There are hundereds of successful coaches that have a lose tongue. Give me a break.



why i do like him- he sucks and TECH will keep beating the AGS the longer he stays :)


BTW- it is football not a bench press contest :)

I know you're just funning, but I think the bench press thing is symptomatic of where that program was when he got there. It was very much on the edge of a cliff. It ended up going off the cliff because Fran was a big culture shock versus RC.

Look, this guy has a track record. He took a doormat in New Mexico to respectablity. TCU was a joke and he made them a bowl team and Paterson has used the same systems and philosophy to make them a top 10 program. He won the SEC while at Bama and they have done quite well the last couple of years with the kids he recruited. His problem at A&M is that for all intents and purposes, he had as difficult a rebuilding job at A&M as any of the other stops. Add that to the fact that OU, UT and Tech have their programs at possibly all time highs. I just hope the Ags have some patience because he will win.

[raider red 2000]

MAC- i think that fran did a good job at TCU- he did a good job of winning with someone else's kids right...i dont think that he was there long enough. same at BAMA. Now i guess he has mostly his kids at ATM, he better start winning or start packing.

i understand about the weights thing and that it si just part of building a program....but i dont think that ATM was in bad shape when they get rid of sloccum. i think that ATM got caught up in keeping up with the joneses.

i know that many caoches cuss too much....and that the college game is worse than HS, but a HC should not talk down on assitants in front of the players....it looks bad...and is just stupid.
save it for the office.

[Macarthur]

Originally posted by raider red 2000
[B]MAC- i think that fran did a good job at TCU- he did a good job of winning with someone else's kids right...i dont think that he was there long enough. same at BAMA. Now i guess he has mostly his kids at ATM, he better start winning or start packing.

That's true, but TCU and Bama have done pretty well since with the kids he did recruit. I think we have seen he can recruit. He's pulled in some talent at A&M despite the results on the field.



i understand about the weights thing and that it si just part of building a program....but i dont think that ATM was in bad shape when they get rid of sloccum. i think that ATM got caught up in keeping up with the joneses.

I disagree on Slocum. I liked him, but he was outmatched in the Big 12 South. Stoops and Mac were starting to clean his clock. RC's last couple of recruiting classes were very poor. If you see that as "keeping up with the Joneses", then I guess you're right.




i know that many caoches cuss too much....and that the college game is worse than HS, but a HC should not talk down on assitants in front of the players....it looks bad...and is just stupid.
save it for the office.

Well, as far as I'm concerned this is speculation. I've not seen any accounts of this.

As for players bad mouthing him and not liking him, (not sure if you said this, but I've seen it posted somewhere) You're always going to find a handfull of kids in a program that don't like the coach. It's really easy to pile on Fran because he hasn't won. However, I've read a lot about his former TCU players and haven't heard one negative. Could it be that the kids at A&M that don't like him were RC's players that no longer fit into Fran's program?

[injuredinmelee]

the things I noticed seeing the ags live last year was, they tired out by third quarter and were painfully slow.

[Macarthur]

Originally posted by injuredinmelee
the things I noticed seeing the ags live last year was, they tired out by third quarter and were painfully slow.

Yeah, I think their depth has been drastically affected because the last 2 years should have been RC's kids in their RS Jr & Sr years. The fact is, very few of those remained. No doubt they must get faster. Fran has been bringing in the right kind of kids and those are just now getting to be RS Jr's & RS Soph, so this year they should show some marked improvement. But, as I said earlier, I think people underestimate how big of a rebuilding job he has had to do. I don't think even he realized how difficult it was going to be to turn the ship. The biggest problem is everyone in the country saw Stoops win a MNC in his second year so eveyone's expectations are way out of wack.

[Chris Hart]

Originally posted by Macarthur





His problem at A&M is that for all intents and purposes, he had as difficult a rebuilding job at A&M as any of the other stops. Add that to the fact that OU, UT and Tech have their programs at possibly all time highs. I just hope the Ags have some patience because he will win. Mac, I think you hit the nail on the head right there. Most people don't see that in their assessments. Texas(National Champions), OU(perennial top 10), Tech(as good as they've ever been). Tech really put it on A&M last year, but the Aggies played very good games against UT and OU and should've won the Clemson game early last year. Their record was poor and so was their play at times, but they weren't all that far from playing in a decent bowl game and having the kind of season everyone expected them to have in Fran's second year. They may even lose to the other big 3 in the south again this year, but those that haven't seen the improvement in Aggie land as a whole since Fran got there, they're just not looking close enough. If the Aggies will be patient and give Fran 3 more years, it'll pay off. If they give up on him and go through another coaching change, it will set the program back again for at least 3 years. Fran WILL get the Aggies back to where they want to be in time. The fact that they're in the Big XII south with possibly 3 top 15 teams doesn't make his job any easier. I think the Aggies will make GREAT STRIDES this year, even if their record doesn't show it, but they may even win a few of those games that they're not expected to win this year. A sign of a good coach is his team wins the games they are supposed to win and occasionally one they're not supposed to. I believe that's what the Aggies will do this year.